Ahmadinejad speaking to empty seats in the UN

Published September 22nd, 2011 - 20:01 GMT

Western delegates walked out after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made reference to what he called the "mysterious September 11th incident" .

Western delegates walked out after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made reference to what he called the "mysterious September 11th incident" and the "slave masters and colonial powers" of the West, during his address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York. The Iranian leader on Thursday also called Israel a "tumor" that should be wiped off the map and suggested that the Holocaust did not happen.

Ahmadinejad attacked the United States for its history of slavery, causing two world wars, using a nuclear bomb against "defenseless people," and imposing and supporting military dictatorships and totalitarian regimes on Asian, African and Latin American nations. According to him, the U.S. used the 9/11 attacks as a pretext for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"By using their imperialistic media network which is under the influence of colonialism they threaten anyone who questions the Holocaust and the September 11 event with sanctions and military actions," Ahmadinejad said. When the idea of an independent fact-finding investigation of "the hidden elements" involved in the Sept. 11 attacks was raised last year, he said, "my country and myself came under pressure and threat by the government of the United States."

"Instead of assigning a fact-finding team, they killed the main perpetrator and threw his body into the sea," Ahmadinejad said.